Enea Bastianini wins the Aragon GP after a good final challenge with Pecco Bagnaia. Aleix Espargarò’s Aprilia on the podium, Fabio Quartararo out.
The 15th MotoGP Grand Prix of the 2022 season is staged on the Aragon circuit. Pecco Bagnaia, fresh from four consecutive victories, started from pole position and immediately took the lead. Behind him, however, the unlikely happens: Marc Marquez loses his rear and is hit by Fabio Quartararo who ends up on the ground and has to retire. Marc is also forced to pit for a piece of the M1 fairing that got stuck in the rear of the Honda RC-V.
Few corners and Taka Nakagami also crashes, for HRC it is another weekend to forget in terms of performance. In Ducati, Pecco Bagnaia and Enea Bastianini are looking to victory and to contend for it. But this time the final outcome changes. The fall of Quartararo allows Pecco to reach -10 points from the summit: “Without a doubt it went great, I did my best, Enea had more traction on the last lap“.
Bastianini blows 5 points to Bagnaia
Enea Bastianini remains glued to his future box-factory mate, earns an average of one tenth per lap, moves in front and then a smudge brings him back behind Pecco Bagnaia. He does not let go of the ‘Beast’ and on the last lap bags the decisive overtaking that leads him to the conquest of his fourth victory of the season. “I touched Alex at the start and recovering the position was difficult. I made some mistakes, got Pecco back and managed to win. A dream for me, now let’s go to Japan“.
Aleix Espargarò’s Aprilia was on the third step of the podium. “I came here with high expectations, but I didn’t start well. I improved step by step, I tried to have fun and attack, third place is fantastic“. 4th Brad Binder in front, Jack Miller, Jorge Martin, Luca Marini, Johann Zarco, Alex Rins and Marco Bezzecchi.
Some grumbles at the official Ducati house for Pecco Bagnaia’s failure to win, with 5 points lost in the race for the world title. But it is a demonstration that there are no team orders, even if in the next races the philosophy could change.
